


Wind Beneath My Wings

by timeheist



Category: Maximum Ride - James Patterson
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-31
Updated: 2013-01-31
Packaged: 2017-11-27 16:26:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/664049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/timeheist/pseuds/timeheist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Getting the hell out of dodge was usually into the air (be it to avoid the gossiping eyes of teenagers or the slashing claws of Erasers), which was the case today.</p><p>NB: Nevermore (final book) spoilers. I'm reckoning they're mid-20s by now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wind Beneath My Wings

Fang had never managed to put a wing out of beat with Max’s in all their years together. It just came naturally. Flying face to face with anyone else in the Flock for too long, even Dylan, eventually led to a face (or worse, a mouth) full of feathers, or an uncomfortable collision of wing bones that usually smarted like hitting your funny bone off a table and led to two very disgruntled bird kids – or as the case may be, no longer kids – lying on the forest floor vying for each other’s throats.

But with Fang it was different. Ever since the end of the world, well, they’d found themselves doing it naturally, staying almost glued to each other when Max wasn’t busying with doing what the Voi- Angel had told her to do, and leading the remaining 1% of the population in mass-hysteria and kick-assed-ness whether she liked it or not. And now that the danger was passed, and the world was rebuilding itself, and ten years had passed in which Max had actually managed to have the famed thing known as a lie-in for more than ten minutes…

It was nice, just her and Fang. The Flock had never left ‘Paradise’, all seven of the original kids (though Dylan kept his distance) and all the new ones that Ella and Dr Martinez had brought along. All the others had returned to their homes in the hopes of rebuilding the lives, or finding loved ones who had the luck – or the simple genetics – to survive. Max had wished them luck but done nothing to disillusion them.

And now their home was ‘Angel Island’ to the rest of the world, and by some miracle, actually pretty damn safe. The ‘bad guys’ hadn’t re-evolved yet and none of the kids who had left had told the rest were they were, only that they existed. The TV signal was pretty good there, and sometimes their benefactor or Dr Martinez emerged with a newspaper, or a magazine, and the flock all gathered around the dinner table – metres long, they still had to shout from one end to the other – to laugh at the latest wild theories.

Paradise island full of over a hundred bird kids or not, Fang and Max still found time to themselves. Iggy, Nudge and the Gasman had learned quickly enough that their treehouses were off limits – eww, kissing and… more, over time – and Angel had rigged up a sort of mental advanced warning system with ‘the Voice’ so they could get clothes and blankets or the hell out of Dodge before anyone walked in on them reacquainting themselves with each other after the year apart.

Getting the hell out of dodge was usually into the air (be it to avoid the gossiping eyes of teenagers or the slashing claws of Erasers), which was the case today. Max was frantically trying to wrap the red cotton sheets she’d torn from her bed around herself as they kept to the trees; no need to traumatise the kids. Fang as usual was the more calm of the two and had already managed to tighten the pull on his boxers and was folding his arms across his chest with his usual, lazy smirk.

“Bastard.”

“Twenty four years.” Wings flapping parallel with Max’s even in her hasty state, Fang reached out to grab his love’s elbow, pulling her gently into the cover of the thicker trees. “You know you love me.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t have to like it.”

“You do.”

“Shut up.”

Though there were plenty of branches that they could have landed on the two of them kept to the trees, silently praying that no one would be out on a random fly around the island and that they would have their privacy. They’d been caught before, and given a lecture, but as the unspoken ‘leaders’ of the extended flock even Dr Martinez hadn’t had the heart to lecture them for long and had demanded that they come and visit sometime soon. Max grinned at Fang as he raised an eyebrow in the dark, his hair longer than it used to be and still flopping over one eye. It was tied back at his neck with a hair-tie stolen, no doubt, from Nudge and one of her posse. How they always seemed to get accessories Max would never know. And under the hair, Fang’s eyes were a pool of…

“You’re staring again.”

“Am not.”

“Am too.”

The two avian humans were nose to nose instinctively, and Max even swore that they were blinking in unison. She could feel her feathers – tawny and golden, whereas Fang’s were black and midnight coloured, like his hair – swishing against his and the touch sent a shiver down her spine. Had it always been like this, so… Sensual? She supposed not. Running for your lives, being beaten up on Tuesdays – and Bank Holidays, don’t forget the Bank Holidays – and never knowing where your next meal was coming from wasn’t actually sensual, was it? But this? This was… perfect.

She leaned in for the kiss, her head tilted to the left and blond almost-curls tucked behind her ear by Fang as he tilted his head to the right with an Eskimo kiss and caught her bottom lip between his teeth. Teeth clacked against teeth as they moved both moved in closers, hands and arms and legs and wings and mouths both finding their perfect match and hitting together aggressively, desperately. There would never be enough time for this, of that Max was certain. She could feel her blanket slipping but she hardly cared, rubbing circles into the sensitive spot behind Fang’s wings, playing with his tongue, eyes closed and guided simply by the noise of him, the smell of him, the air cradling them together like nothing she’d ever dreamed of… Everything she’d ever dreamed of…

Old Fang would’ve pulled back with a told-you-so by now by Max could feel him against her leg, and wrapped hers tighter around his waist, using him for support as she clawed at his shoulders, trying to pull him ever closer. Neither of them pulled back for air; what was the use for gills otherwise? They could hold their breath much longer than the humans from before the 99% Plan. The wind and the leaves and the slices of sunshine flew around them, and Max could think of nothing better in the world than Fang’s wings, Fang’s lips, and Fang’s little place in this world where she finally felt at home.


End file.
